Salsa Garden

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ThumbOfDoom Oklahoma City, OK Feb 15, 2010

I live in central Oklahoma, Land of the Redman and tempermental weather. I am thinking of starting a little salsa garden. Just tomato, jalapenos, onion and cilantro. Can I start my plants now, in February, indoors? I have a window at work that gets the western afternoon sun in all its glory (and heat). It's a nice sunny warm spot.
I also wonder if cilantro is a bit ambitious. I always see it in great bunches at the supermarket though.
ADIVISE ME. I could kill a pet rock and I need some encouragement.

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Dorkasaurus Albuquerque, NM(Zone 7a) Feb 16, 2010

I've been known to kill a few plants but cilantro is pretty easy to grow. I usually wait till spring and start the seeds directly in the ground.

Peppers I usually start late Feb/early March indoors since I can't move them outdoors until late May/early June usually.

I usually start my tomatoes a couple weeks after the peppers, but that's mainly because they grow fast and I have limited indoor space for them.

No idea on the onions since I don't grow them much.

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dreaves Hutto, TX(Zone 8b) Feb 16, 2010

Thumb,

I used the frost date lookup, on the Guides & Information page (near the bottom) for the OK City central zipcode:

http://davesgarden.com/guides/freeze-frost-dates/index.php?q=73101&submit=Go

It says that the last frost date is April 19th, with the average last frost a little earlier at April 7. You can safely plant tomatoes out by the last frost date. If you plant long-season tomatoes (with days to maturity over 75 days or so) then you can plant a little earlier, but you MAY have to cover them if a frost or freeze threatens. People usually plant the peppers outside about 2 weeks later than tomatoes, because peppers don't like cooler weather.

So, with all that said, you normally want to start tomatoes & peppers about 6-8 weeks before you plan to transplant. Also, pepper seedlings grow a little slower usually, so it doesn't hurt to start them a little earlier and grow for 8-10 weeks. If you plant your peppers two weeks later than tomatoes, you can start both at the same time. Given a plant out date in mid-April for tomatoes, and late April for peppers...I would plant the seeds inside right away.

The other thing you may want to consider is using a florescent shop light or two to give the seedlings light. It's likely that even a very sunny window won't give the plants enough light. There are lots of discussions about lights in different forums--pretty much everyone agrees that plain florescent lights are good, but they have to be really close (1-2") from the plants. I have a PVC frame to hang the light and I use the chains that come with the cheap shop lights to adjust. (I'd attach a picture, but my batteries are dead in the camera.)

David

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